Restaurants are first a business.
The statement above seems obvious, but many who start a restaurant do it for other reasons. Good business practices still apply such as budgeting, profit, product development, pricing, staffing, training, and execution. Starting a restaurant is not a hobby, a part time possibility, or for the faint of heart. Restaurants are also unlike most other business. Like all great design, the best restaurants are both a sensory and an emotional experience. The two quotes below capture the essence of this.
The meal. A meal means reconciliation and peace, friendship, a respite from work, refreshment, energizing life, sharing life and love, friendship, hospitality, warmth, communication, reinforcing, forming community.
- Don Talafous O.S.B.
We turn a biological necessity, into a carefully cultured phenomenon. We use eating as a medium for social relationships: satisfaction of the most individual of needs becomes a means of creating community.
-Margaret Visser in The Rituals of Dinner, p ix (1991)
When done well, guests' sensors register pleasure. The music is a pleasing selection and the volume is appropriate for the concept. Wonderful aromas drift from the food. The room temperature is comfortable for the guests, (and hopefully, though not necessarily, for the staff). The food tastes amazing.
They feel happy and valued. Mentally and physically they feel relaxed, yet often will feel energized from restaurant staff taking such care with them.
They eat delicious nourishing food (they likely do not know how to prepare.) They later crave it again. They discover a new wine to love. They embrace the attentive and caring service. Memories are created. Traditions are begun and then celebrated. This is as true for casual or fast food restaurants as it is for full service and fine dining.
To be successful, both categories of emotional and sensory experiences need to be identifed, valued, communicated, and woven into all aspects of the planning, design, technology, and financial metrics.
-ETJ
They feel happy and valued. Mentally and physically they feel relaxed, yet often will feel energized from restaurant staff taking such care with them.
They eat delicious nourishing food (they likely do not know how to prepare.) They later crave it again. They discover a new wine to love. They embrace the attentive and caring service. Memories are created. Traditions are begun and then celebrated. This is as true for casual or fast food restaurants as it is for full service and fine dining.
To be successful, both categories of emotional and sensory experiences need to be identifed, valued, communicated, and woven into all aspects of the planning, design, technology, and financial metrics.
-ETJ